OPNsense aarch64 firmware repository

[OPNdrk]

Hi Maurice

First off, wonderful work. In the name of everyone else who doesn't say it: thank you!

Before I spend some money (not a lot) on a Watchguard Firebox T80, I wonder if  this unofficial ARM release would even run on it.
As far as I can find, the T80 specs are:
Processor NXP LS1046A 1.2GHz (a 4 core 64-bit Arm Cortex-A72)
Memory: DDR4 4 GB

I don't have experience with OPNsense, but I'm here because I want to try it obviously. I'm wondering how it will perform with 4GB of memory. I would not use it in a heavy setting. Just some basic home use with VPN and monitoring/blocking tools. I'm also curious if OPNsense will be able to support all ethernet ports including providing power to the two PoE ports.

I respect that you may not have the answer to all questions. As long as I would get a good indication that it would run, I'm willing to give it a try and provide as good feedback as possible. I like the relatively small form factor and the fact that there aren't any annoying fans :)

[Maurice]

Please be aware that this little project is about OPNsense aarch64 sets and packages (as well as VM images), not about hardware-specific / bare-metal images.

As a first step, you'll have to do your own research about booting a general-purpose OS (BSD, Linux) on this appliance. If such a project exists or you figure it out yourself, then running OPNsense might be possible.

4 GB RAM is sufficient, I maintain some OPNsense systems with 2 GB or less for small setups.

[OPNdrk]

Understood. I will check around for that first, thank you for the advice Maurice!

[jack.horder]

Hi Maurice,

I've used your QEMU qcow2 image within an aarch64 installation of Proxmox which manages to boot up and can get to the main OPNsense dashboard, however I'm having some issues with obtaining a WAN connection through PPPoE. I'm using the virtio bridge networks in Proxmox, similar to how the PFsense documentation mentions (two physical NICs on my arm device, two bridge interfaces in proxmox (one for LAN, one for WAN) and LAN is working with no issues, however having some issues with the WAN connection. It could be my lack of knowledge of OPNsense but I was thinking to try on bare-metal and see if anything changes.

You mentioned a few posts ago that if you could get FreeBSD booted up on the device, then you might be able to get OPNsense working. I found some UEFI firmware for my device which I have flashed and can boot FreeBSD using the image FreeBSD-14.3-RELEASE-arm64-aarch64-dvd1.iso, however when trying to bootstrap OPNsense after that using the official tool, it says this is only compatible with amd64. I was thinking I could use your repository to get the correct packages in order to bootstrap OPNsense on my aarch64 EFI installation I managed to get working.

Apologies if these are dumb questions. This is my first adventure into the world of BSD and working with arm architecture in general so if you have a general direction I could go in that would be great.

Please be aware that this little project is about OPNsense aarch64 sets and packages (as well as VM images), not about hardware-specific / bare-metal images.

As a first step, you'll have to do your own research about booting a general-purpose OS (BSD, Linux) on this appliance. If such a project exists or you figure it out yourself, then running OPNsense might be possible.

4 GB RAM is sufficient, I maintain some OPNsense systems with 2 GB or less for small setups.

[jack.horder]

Hi Maurice,

I've used your QEMU qcow2 image within an aarch64 installation of Proxmox which manages to boot up and can get to the main OPNsense dashboard, however I'm having some issues with obtaining a WAN connection through PPPoE. I'm using the virtio bridge networks in Proxmox, similar to how the PFsense documentation mentions (two physical NICs on my arm device, two bridge interfaces in proxmox (one for LAN, one for WAN) and LAN is working with no issues, however having some issues with the WAN connection. It could be my lack of knowledge of OPNsense but I was thinking to try on bare-metal and see if anything changes.

You mentioned a few posts ago that if you could get FreeBSD booted up on the device, then you might be able to get OPNsense working. I found some UEFI firmware for my device which I have flashed and can boot FreeBSD using the image FreeBSD-14.3-RELEASE-arm64-aarch64-dvd1.iso, however when trying to bootstrap OPNsense after that using the official tool, it says this is only compatible with amd64. I was thinking I could use your repository to get the correct packages in order to bootstrap OPNsense on my aarch64 EFI installation I managed to get working.

Apologies if these are dumb questions. This is my first adventure into the world of BSD and working with arm architecture in general so if you have a general direction I could go in that would be great.

Please be aware that this little project is about OPNsense aarch64 sets and packages (as well as VM images), not about hardware-specific / bare-metal images.

As a first step, you'll have to do your own research about booting a general-purpose OS (BSD, Linux) on this appliance. If such a project exists or you figure it out yourself, then running OPNsense might be possible.

4 GB RAM is sufficient, I maintain some OPNsense systems with 2 GB or less for small setups.

[Maurice]

Correct, opnsense-bootstrap only works on amd64. I thought about adapting it for aarch64 before, but that's currently very low priority.

It shouldn't be required though. You can convert a qcow2 image to a raw image (or build your own) and boot it bare metal.

What makes the VM images VM images is the file format (qcow2 / vhdx / ...). Other than that, there is nothing specifically "virtual" about them.

Cheers
Maurice